He woke up to several system windows, he felt exhausted and he still didn't have legs below the knees, despite the pain and the trauma of being eaten alive, he was smiling that he was still alive as he read the windows.
"The 48 hours have concluded"
"The planets magic and zones will now finish formation"
"Stay inside the dungeon for 2 weeks to allow this process to complete"
"You have retreated to a safe zone"
"Your normal out of combat regeneration will resume"
"The level is being reset, it will take 1 hour"
He glanced toward the tunnel entrance and there was a semi transparent barrier in place with a timer counting down in the middle of it. He still had 46 minutes until he could try again, however it will take longer than that for him to heal and he noticed he was thirsty and it was the first time he had been thirsty since this started. He had gone days without eating before during deployments so the lack of eating he hadn't noticed, but no water was a new one. He looked up at the ceiling and spoke out loud to the system. "No food or water in here and I have to stay for 2 weeks, I'm not sure I can survive that." Eli said in a casual voice like he was asking a friend for advice on a problem with his car.
"You can survive on magic alone after you obtain a class for now."
"During times of dramatic physical damage, blood loss, or stress, hunger and thirst can appear as a reflex."
Eli read the responses a few times and it seemed like straight forward information but he still always felt like the systems responses were always leading him in a direction with what it said or didn't say. It didn't really matter at this point since this dungeon was the only thing on his to-do list for the next 2 weeks. He was going to clear it and get good times, while leveling to 20 here. The next step was a plan, he had time so he should work on another node to gain strength, or maybe see what it takes to level his body or his skills. He needed to game out how that room works and how to stop that big guy from throwing rats at him at ridiculous speeds.
He started to put together what he knew to try and game out the room. The tunnel surface blocked sound and the rats did not seem to have eyes so they must be using echolocation. The question was why was there silence in the room and only the loud clicks from presumably the big guy? It could be that all of them rely on the big guy for locations or maybe it's some kind of hive mind and they see what it sees. He scratched his chin while thinking about the possibilities, but then the pain from his regenerating legs hit a new high while regrowing his knees and all thought left him. Gritting his teeth, he tried to focus on something to get him through it, he just needed to focus his mind on something that would hopefully keep him from passing out again. This pain was worse than getting shot, was worse than a broken bone, and worse than that beetle's poison from when all this started.
Reforming bone was not a pleasant experience, it was the kind of sensation that will be with him forever, he smiled to himself thinking about if he got one of those weather predicting trick knees like some of his foster grandparents had. This wasn't going fast enough and he was starting to feel like he was going to lose consciousness again from the pain. He needed something to focus on, it had to be another person, as he had witnessed many times in the military humans were capable of amazing feats if they were doing it for someone else's sake. However, Eli didn't have someone like this in his life, he was an orphan with no memories from before he was 12 and never really felt connected to anyone. Maybe the soldiers in his squad, but he didn't feel connected to them as strongly as they were to him, especially Lambert, there were feelings there, they just always felt buried. It was like he wanted to care for her but it just wouldn't come to the surface. He never understood why but he just didn't click with most people.
Eli was losing the fight to stay awake and could not think of anyone or anything he was attached to enough to be a driving force in his life, he just wanted to stop powerful evil from continuing to cause suffering. That was why he worked so hard at his job, but politics always gave him a bad taste in his mouth, compromising with evil people just didn't feel right. Maybe his attachment wasn't to people but to a cause, to the hope for a better world, as he tried to hold that thought in his mind, the regeneration started on his kneecaps and he blacked out again.
He woke up again and the pain was gone, he was all healed up, but he still had the same problem and the barrier had 5 minutes left. Eli would try again when that time was up, see if he could find anything he missed the first time. The best idea he had so far was to clear the floor of the tunnel of the spikes to give him somewhere to retreat to where he could stand and fight. He held his bone mace tightly in his hand and adjusted his ape underwear and prepared for a lot more biting and hopefully he could get more kills and find a strategy to clear this.
Starting at the tunnel entrance he used his mace to sweep across the floor and clear a 2 foot path that he could walk on. After the first few feet, he paused and listened for any noise coming from the chamber ahead. He didn't hear anything and continued for a few more feet and checked again, the clearing of the spikes was only making a crunching sound, but he was nervous about them rushing down the tunnel at him. Nearing the end of the tunnel and still not hearing a sound, he took his time clearing the spikes as silently as he could, and with only about a foot left he heard the clicking sound again.
Suddenly, Eli got an idea, he could lure them into the tunnel keeping them in front of him and try to clear the small ones with smashes before moving on to the big guy. He cranked up the light his body was emitting for a moment and saw the mass of eyeless rats just kind of standing around. Most of them were moving but not in a direction just staying basically where they were but moving in a way that was silent, Eli could not hear a thing except his own heartbeat pulsing in his ears. He thought of making noise to get their attention but he was worried about the big guy starting his barrage early, so he thought that maybe these things could smell his blood. At least they seemed to be able to smell the blood last time.
He bit into his finger to draw blood and it took some effort due to his endurance to finally get through and he let a few drops hit the ground. The drops fell right at the edge of the tunnel and he slowly took a step back, ready to start smashing as soon as they took the bait. Two of them raised their noses in the air and started moving towards him, he tucked his mace under his arm and got ready. They were moving cautiously and silently closer to the blood drops and right before they could get to them, he grabbed one in each hand, squished them in his hands and lightly tossed them into the edge of the collection of rats.
The swarming began immediately, each rat trying to get some of the meat and blood, they were so savage about getting it that more and more rats got injured or killed causing more frenzy and it started escalating quickly. Eli was still about 3 feet inside the tunnel just watching it with grim fascination, some of the ones who had been eating from the beginning were starting to get big. Not like the big guy at the other end but double in length and seemed to start eating any rat that happened to be close even if they were alive and uninjured. After only 40 seconds or so there were 4 standouts eating the rest of the rats, each about 3 feet long and the rats were so numerous it didn't seem like they were going to run out of food any time soon.
Another 3 minutes went by with him being as still and quiet as possible, even going so far as to control his breathing to make it almost silent and the 4 rats were almost done with the small ones. Each was over 5 feet long now with a tail that looked more like a bullwhip than a rat tail just as long. All 4 were swinging their tail around and one was getting close to hitting the tunnel edge just as another's tail hit a third one and they started fighting. Eli knew that he would rather fight 4 at this strength then if they all combined so he slowly started to leave his tunnel as 2 were fighting and the other two were eating small ones.
His first step out of the tunnel he heard the clicking dolphin-like noises again and the 4 stopped what they were doing. Eli thought this might happen and had planned on jumping to one of them instantly smashing it. He did, and turned to the other one that wasn't fighting as it turned to him and its tail came whipping around. Gripping his Bone Mace tightly, he swung it in a wide arc to try and intercept the tail, which he did, but not in the way he expected. The large rat's tail wrapped around his mace and tugged on it, however, while Eli was shocked that this happened, his grip was not so easily overcome. While the rat was struggling to no avail, he pulled on his mace and grabbed the rat's tail with his left hand and yanked, pulling the rat closer. Then he swung hard at the tail and sent the rat crashing into the 2 that had been fighting, they were still untangling themselves from each other to try and come after him.
When the third one hit the other two, there was a crunch sound of broken bones and now all three of them were tangled up with each other causing even more damage fighting like hell to get free and come after him. He wanted to wait it out but knew the boss rat was going to make his move soon so he took a few running steps and leapt to get in a big smash on all three. Just as his foot left the ground he was hit with a projectile rat and knocked off course missing them entirely. The timing was too perfect, it had been waiting for that chance. Eli rolled to put the slowly untangling rats between him and where that cannonball rat had come from. He needed to finish these guys off so he could get to the big one. Eli decided to burn some earth magic and give them a large smash and hopefully take them out all at once. He reached up and pushed his stone magic into his mace, probably more than he ever has to date and let it loose on contact. A large boom! Echoed in the chamber and the three rats turned to red mist as the whole place shook, knocking loose some stone from the ceiling.
"Hehe… whoops" Eli said out loud as he realized that durability was not one of these rats' strengths and he may have overdone it a bit. Eli looked around and couldn't find the big guy, he kept looking and started slowly walking around where most of the fighting had taken place but still couldn't see anything. He flared the light from his body and saw it, near the far wall in between him and the tunnel, standing in a fight ready stance with his tail circling around him. It looked to be on the defensive, he thought. I wonder if I scared it with that hit, but that didn't seem right either since this rat didn't seem the type for fear. Right before he reduced his light he saw some blood coming out of its ears and realized what had happened.
The large noise from his empowered smash must have damaged its hearing and so it didn't know where Eli was or if he was approaching. That explains its behavior way better than fear. It didn't seem to be recovering very quickly so maybe its regeneration was stunted in here just like Eli's was. Either way, the best option was to attack while it was impaired even if it was on high alert. Eli made a light jog in its direction until he was close enough to jump and get a smash in from above, but right as he was about to hit it, the rats very long, whip-like tail smashed into him from the side and knocked him, bouncing and skidding on the ground, all the way back to the wall with the entrance tunnel in it.
Now with a considerable amount of skin missing and blood dripping from him, he could see that the boss could sense his surroundings with more than just hearing. He did not have the time to puzzle it out so he ran to the center of the room and jumped and used smash again but this time on the ground in the center of the room. A loud crack rang out and a 6 foot wide crater was now in the center of the room and everything shook again. Dropping stones and pebbles from the ceiling. Eli sprinted for the boss, thinking this was his best chance, his attack was still echoing around and now the sound of hundreds of stones hitting the ground was also masking the noise of his movements. He was moving toward the rat at his max speed, and began winding up his mace for a smash when he saw that the rat had predicted this and its tail was already in motion, sweeping out to counter him.
Again, Eli was going to use his untested skill and pictured himself still moving, still swinging, just on the other side of its tail and blinked his eye as fast as he could. It worked to the shock of both of them and his smash came down on the rat with so much force that all but its head and tail were liquified and splattered on the back wall painting a 40 foot by 40 foot section bright vivid red. He still needed to do more testing with this skill but he was pretty sure it increased momentum, or maybe his image of himself on the other side of the tail had more momentum and that is what caused it. In any case, he cleared the first floor of this dungeon and was waiting to see what was next when he noticed that his right hand and wrist were broken again. It looked like his body was still not strong enough to handle what he could do.